Cupcakes
by Antilles
Summary: It should be relatively easy to bake a dozen cupcakes what with the instruction and materials provided...right? well, the Tracy boys are about to find out. one-shot, movie-verse


_**Cupcakes**_

_**Disclaimer: I don't own the Thunderbirds.**_

**_Summary: it should be relatively easy to bake a dozen of cupcakes when you have the instructions and the accompanying mix… right? Well, the Tracy boys are about to find out. Set when the IR was running for about three years, movie-verse_**

**_A/N: The idea for this story popped up as I myself suffered today from baking a batch of cupcakes. And please forgive me for a few mistakes – I'm writing it way too late! Few reasons I hate baking with those mixes: the glass bowl we use is way too heavy, the butter and the flour are always giving me a hard time, and I usually forget to time it… so my first attempt was a mess… If not for my mom correcting me I would have got exactly the end results of this very story! On with the story itself:_**

"You will need three eggs, a mix itself, 250 ml of milk, and 75 ml of vegetable oil… Got all of that, Alan?" John asked his youngest sibling.

"Yeah, I think so…" Alan trailed off, glancing around the kitchen.

Earlier before, he pulled out a box with dozen of eggs, a pack of milk and a bottle of vegetable oil and lined it on the counter.

"Yep, I have it all here." He confirmed.

It was a midday on the Tracy Island. Scott and Gordon were by the pool, Virgil – if Alan's hearing didn't desert him – was in the living room playing piano, and John was up on Thunderbird Five. However, that didn't stop the second oldest Tracy to help his youngest brother make some cupcakes. Even through the only thing he could do was give instructions.

"Okay, Al, now you got to choose the pan in which you're going to bake them," John said. "You have the options, right?"

"Yep. Since it's cupcakes, I think it will be this one." Alan waved the pan he was going to use, and John nodded in approval. That one had several places a small cake would go.

"All right, now take the butter and make sure you have it on the pan… so the cakes won't burn. Then add the flour there."

Alan frowned at the pack of butter. The bag of flour landed heavily by his feet, and Alan tripped over it as he went to cut the butter for the pan.

The butter flew out of Alan's hand in order to land way out into Virgil's hair, who chose the moment to peek into the kitchen. Alan himself sprawled on the floor with a remarkable amount of flour in his own hair and face, as well as a cloud of flour in the air.

"Neat job, Alan," John commended from the screen, barely hiding a smile. "Hey, Virgil, are you going to eat that whole bunch of butter or let Alan use some for the cupcakes?"

Virgil, who had been on the verge of telling the youngest Tracy off for the mess in the kitchen, brightened considerably at John's remark.

"Alan, you had to put them in the pan, not in my hair," was the only thing he said as he corrected the place for the butter. "All right, what do we do next, John?"

"Next, you mix the ingredients together," John replied. "You dump the mix into the bowl, then add the eggs, milk and oil and stir it. Got it?"

"Yeah." Virgil dumped a bowl large enough on the counter, while Alan added the ingredients John counted off into it.

"Alan, just the eggs, not their shells," Virgil groaned. "Now we mix it, right John?"

"Yeah…" John trailed off, as Virgil took the bowl and dashed out. "Uh, Vir-gil, the spoons are in there – "

He trailed off as the door slammed shut.

"You know," Alan started, as he waited for Virgil to return. "I'm quite certain that the instructions say to BLEND the mix, not to…"

A roar of engines interrupted his sentence, as well as finally brought Gordon and Scott up to the kitchen from the pool.

"Ummm… Virgil… I don't think the instructions here say that the mix needs to be stirred by…" John trailed off, as Virgil turned his communicator off. A second later, a deafening roar shook the whole island for the second time. Scott and Gordon jumped.

At the moment of deafening silence, John finished hesitantly, "…Um… stirred by the engines of Thunderbird Two, I was going to say…"

Scott surveyed the clouds of flour still in the air and brushed some off his shoulder.

"What in blazes is going on?" he asked calmly.

"Well, we were trying to bake some cupcakes…" Alan told him. "Everything went relatively well until Virgil decided that the fastest way to mix them was THAT." He helplessly gestured in the general direction of Virgil, Thunderbird Two, and the missing mixture.

"No, most certainly not," Scott agreed calmly. "And it looks like we now lost a dish as well," he added with a sigh, as Virgil came back into the room.

Obviously, the middle brother's hands were empty. What was once edible, was now not, as half of it – Scott was sure of that much – was left behind in the Thunderbird Two's silo, while Virgil himself sporteed the other half.

Seeing his other two brothers, Virgil gave a sheepish grin and a light wave.

"Did you two come to help?" He asked. "I think your method of mixing it would be more effective, Johnny…" He sniffed the parts of the mix that still were on him. "It looks like this cake is burnt."

"Oh, boy…" John sighed.

For the moment, John was quite happy that he wasn't down side along with his brothers… Their father won't be pleased with the mess as it is…

"All right, you lot, can you please do everything properly now?" he pleaded. His brothers gave him dubious looks and devilish grins.

"Oh, don't worry, Johnny, we won't screw up this time," Alan promised.

six minutes later

Promises are meant to be broken, John mused. The mix was done without the trouble, and now it was time to actually put it into the forms. So theTracy brothersarmed themselves with table spoons and begun spooning the mix into the bowls.

"Hey, I was going to pour it here," Gordon protested, as Virgil's spoon ended up taking the place he was managing to put it in.

"Sorry, Gordo, there are plenty of other spaces." Virgil chuckled.

"Hey!"

A mere second later, a precisely timed missile of raw dough met with Virgil's face. Virgil grunted and flipped his own spoonful at the offender. Laughing, Gordon ducked, and the missile hit Scott.

"Dough fight!" Alan whooped from his spot and hurled another missile in Gordon's direction, immediately becoming a practice target for Scott.

Up at Thunderbird Five, John grinned, hiding his face behind his hands.

'This was going to be a long half an hour…'

fifteen minutes later

After finishing off their fight and preparing another batch of the dough, the boys finally managed to spoon the dough into its rightful place. And Virgil just had to put his elbow on the bowl.

The bowl slipped on the floor along with Virgil with resounding crash, sending another cloud of flour in the air. While the brothers coughed and spluttered, Scott managed to shove the pan with the cupcakes safely into the oven and leaned back on the counter with a sigh.

"How many minutes did you say, Johnny?" He asked with a grin.

"Twenty for this particular pan," John responded. "However, I'd say eighteen for our oven… Anyways, check it over the time, and leave them be for a few more minutes before they're done."

"All right," Scott agreed readily. "We'll do that."

"I think I'll sign out for now," John responded. "I really have to get back to my job now."

"Sure, John, thanks for help," Alan managed from somewhere in the cloud of flour.

"Anytime," John smirked. "Scott, don't forget, no longer than twenty minutes!"

"Yeah, yeah," Scott replied.

fifty minutes later

"Wow, did we do all this?"

Scott gazed with open mouth at the kitchen mess. His brothers were sitting on the floor amidst the shards of glass and clouds of flour. All of them, himself included, were covered from head to foot in raw dough. And the kitchen looked like it wasn't cleaned in ages. Scott was willing to bet his 'bird that Thunderbird Two's silo was looking much worse after Virgil's small experiment in it.

"Uh-huh," Alan nodded his head vigorously. "And most importantly, we didn't mean to do a thing besides those cupcakes!"

"Yeah," Virgil sighed, removing a bit of dough from his hair and looking at it sullenly.

"I didn't think baking cupcakes would be this hard," Gordon added, immediately coughing up another small duster of flour. "Kyrano sure seems to be doing it so easily!"

Scott just sighed.

"Virgil. Go clean Thunderbird Two's silo. We'll do the clean up here."

"Sure."

Virgil turned to the exit and froze. So did the other brothers, once they got a good look at the kitchen's entrance. Their father, Jeff, as well as their friend TinTin Kyrano and her father, Alan's friend Fermat and his father Brains were all gaping at the kitchen and the four boys.

"Um… Hi, Dad," Scott finally said cheerfully, waving in the general direction of his father. He sent up an anticipated cloud of flour and immediately coughed.

"What… on earth… had happened… here?" Jeff asked dangerously.

"Ummm… We were trying to cook?" Alan suggested timidly, glancing at his eldest brother for help.

"Uh… Scott…" Virgil pointed at the oven as ominous black clouds of smoke rose from it. "…Uh… didn't John say something about twenty minutes?"

"Oh, shit!" Scott dived towards the oven, tripping Alan and sprawling on the floor for the first time.

Waving his hand to clean the air, Jeff reached the oven first, turning it off.

"Hmm…" He raised a sceptical eyebrow at the pan he held up in his hands. "Not bad for the first try, boys. Anyone would like to try it?"

The others exchanged half-guilty, half-amused looks. The cupcakes were quite effectively burned, and some of them were even sporting small flames. Everyone vigorously shook their heads in denial in answer to Jeff's question.

Jeff grinned.

"I thought so. Pleas follow the instructions more carefully next time, you four."

Needless to say, the miserable batch of cupcakes went outside into the trash bin. Well, almost all of it.

But that's another story.


End file.
